Last Saturday, Brass Behavior (our student brass quartet) headed down to the Greenbelt Stage for the Idaho Falls Youth Jam.
Our members included Jackson Phillips (Trumpet 1), Erika Hiruta (Trumpet 2), Evan Reed (Trombone), and me (French horn). We had the full sound-system treatment, with microphones and speakers carrying our sound out across the Greenbelt, which was a lot of fun.
We also happened to be playing on a 98-degree day, because apparently brass instruments weren’t challenging enough on their own. 😄 Thankfully, we had shade over the stage and a nice breeze coming through, so we survived just fine.
We packed a lot of music into those 45 minutes. We opened with The Star-Spangled Banner, then bounced all over the musical map with everything from Take Me Out to the Ball Game and American Patrol to La Bamba, Amazing Grace, Old Time Rock ’N’ Roll, and even Nearer My God to Thee, with its connection to the Titanic. (If you’ve seen the movie, you know!)
We finished with Kiss Him Goodbye, because eventually they really do make you stop playing.
That variety is one of my favorite things about Brass Behavior. We can play a folk song, an old march, a hymn, a little rock ’n’ roll, or whatever else looks like it might be fun to put on the stands.
Brass Behavior also gives my private brass students a chance to do something beyond lessons and practicing at home. They get to learn how to play with other musicians, rehearse as a group, perform for an audience, and discover what it feels like when all that individual practice turns into actual music out in the world.
Thanks to Youth Jam for inviting us to play. We had a great time, and if you have an event you’d like some live brass music for, let us know! 🎺🎶